Poetry, a selection

I used to not get poetry.

Why would you write something so extravagant just to describe something mundane, like a tree?

I only really understood it after I wrote my first poem, Ode to Books, as homework for a literature class. The more I wrote and read, the more I fell in love with not just poetry, but with language itself.

Here you’ll find a variety of poems I’ve written – all containing different topics, themes, and atmospheres.

Neverheards

Torch the demons

burn them bright

Torch the witches

Show them light

Torch the demons

burn them bright

Torch the witches

Show them light

Torch the demons

burn them bright

Torch the witches

Show them light

Torch the demons

burn them bright

Torch the witches

Show them light

Torch the demons

burn them bright

Torch the witches

Show them light

Torch the demons

burn them bright

Torch the witches

Show them light

Torch the demons

burn them bright

Torch the witches

Show them light

Torch the demons

burn them bright

Torch the witches

Show them light

Torch the demons

burn them bright

Torch the witches

Show them light

Torch the demons

burn them bright

Torch the witches

Show them light

Torch the demons

burn them bright

Torch the witches

Show them light

Torch the demons

burn them bright

Torch the witches

Show them light

Torch the demons

burn them bright

Torch the witches

Show them light

Wriggle.

Wrig-gle.

You don’t know when it began

Only that it wasn’t just going to go away.

Nonono… definitely here to stay.

Ohhh did you even think THAT?

Or did you just unconsciously accept it?

If you had it your way

You would have yelled

And screamed

And triumphed over…

What?

Who would you yell at?

Who would listen?

Why bother when everyone else is yelling, just as you are?

Do you have something to say?

Ok, go ahead, I’ll listen

But let me tell you this:

Its not that they like you, or even despise you,

But its that they just don’t know;

They didn’t know that they

Should care

 –  to listen to THAT voice

– In THAT town

– To look behind THAT

 f a ç a d e.

And maybe they

C    o    u    l    d

Have found something in that jangly

dangly

dump of words?

This is what

digs in,

This is what

pulls it’s claws down,

This is what

stings and stays:

YOU’LL NEVER BE THE LOUDEST VOICE.

WE’RE ALL NEVERHEARDS.

(but shall I try anyway?)

torch the demons

burn them bright

Torch the witches

Show them light

Torch the demons

burn them bright

Torch the witches

Show them light

Torch the demons

burn them bright

Torch the witches

Show them light

Torch the demons

burn them bright

Torch the witches

Show them light

Torch the demons

burn them bright

Torch the witches

Show them light

Torch the demons

burn them bright

Torch the witches

Show them light

Torch the demons

burn them bright

Torch the witches

Show them light

Torch the demons

burn them bright

Torch the witches

Show them light

Torch the demons

burn them bright

Torch the witches

Show them light

Torch the demons

burn them bright

Torch the witches

Show them light

Torch the demons

burn them bright

Torch the witches

Show them light

Torch the demons

burn them bright

Torch the witches

Show them light

Torch the demons

burn them bright

Torch the witches

Show them light

Ode to books

In a room with you

your aura floods over me;

I am quiet,

I am calm,

I am in a dwelling of the

known.

You are everywhere;

Shelves and shelves.

coloured spines

fashion nonsensical rainbows.

The words form

and flow;

words written

by the prosperous,

words written

by the poor, who

were gone

too presently

to see the impact

of their opus.

Once opened,

Your paper breathes into my lungs.

The escapades

embedded within are hidden gems,

a weight in my arms;

a weight in my heart.

Like a

cacophonic forest fire,

Like the

crashes of phenomenal waves;

You roar a

melancholy trouble,

A trouble

without a straight road to the end.

There’s power

to quieten a room,

power

to make men shiver

– despite sunlight’s streams

saturating the room.

You can break hearts,

You can ignite others;

And yet …

a tale

laced with

enchantment

lulls infants to the land

of dreams.

Whether leather-bound

or paperback,

Time always catches on.

Every toss,

every scratch

and every tear

defines you.

Your history;

Another story.

Oh, how the beauty suffers

Don’t devote yourself to Aphrodite

In the attempt to attain attraction –

She’s not giving it out eagerly.

You see,

Her beginning is always depicted

as something…

Beautiful,

Graceful;

Slipping onto the

shores of Greece

on a shell;

The embodiment of ease,

Personification

of perfection!

But who thought

That being formed out of

sea foam

and a

castrated penis

would be pleasant?

Who was there to give a crap

when she crawled onto Kytheran sands?

Is that loveliness

– being left alone?

Your father

– a piece of a banished primordial;

Your mother

– non-existent.

(but oh,

how she was going to make people give a crap)

She had her fun

When she moved to Sparta.

Worshipped for war,

Beauty on the battlefield!

Perhaps there was beauty in rage,

But what would the world

have looked like

Had her first lessons

been in anything but

fine tuning

her skills in torment?

The world split her then;

they didn’t like love hurting so much;

They changed her,

twisted her,

fashioned her

into three.

THREE!

oh, how divine,

Just choose an epithet –

Take your pick:

Areia, Urania et Pandemos;

  • and forget the rest!

Why have a complicated goddess,

when you could see

what you wanted to see?

Why live in a contradicting world,

When you could have a simple one?

(but this was not the Grecian way)

No amount of titles

would make Aphrodite

forget even

a fraction of herself;

She was going to show the world

Her –

inexplicably,

unequivocally,

Her.

An oddity that Aphrodite is,

A three-in-one goddess.

What part of her is to blame

For the trojan mess?

A winner she was,

Of the beauty she’d already claimed;

Was it validation she sought?

Or merely the chaos that was to pursue?

Perhaps it was strength, a test

And proof of power?

Well then,

She needn’t worry;

For a fourth facade

did she sculpt for herself.

V E N U S

G E N E T R I X.

     – Venus the mother –

Needn’t she even try

To be beloved by Rome –

The heavy work left

to her posterities.

A son, Aeneas;

ancestor

To the twins of

Remus and Romulus.

Not just a goddess

of motherhood now –

add political power to

the ever-growing list!

Even Caesar himself

A descendent

Of yours truly.

Perhaps she is the true

King of Olympus,

For we all know the

mischief Zeus gets up to,

And we all know how

Hera can never seem

to cease it.

Perhaps pretty little Aphrodite

pulls the strings;

Lazily at her dais.

And perhaps in her time,

she just grew tired of

a direct push for power;

oh the squabbling,

the fighting,

how it’d never end…

no, much better

to watch the puppets

play their games.

And how giddy

it must feel

to deceive a “king”

s u c c e s s f u l l y .

So make your demands,

Oh little devotee

And see what you get

Out of the lush Aphrodite.

Perhaps you’ll be delighted,

– But I doubt it.

The Iaconic

The masks we adorn

and endure

bury our feelings behind them.

we make sure they’re strapped on

– Skin-tight –

Because we are too

 neglectful

to nurture what’s

beneath.

It’s hidden down –

Deep inside;

Secrets that are left to

fester

and thrive.

but honey,

dear,

there is something else –

αἴκα           αἴκα           αἴκα

Weave your passions

into your heart.

have the nerve

to defend it.

Redefine yourself,

Then do it again.

“WHAT IF YOU FAIL”?

  • αἴκα

“WHAT IF YOU FALL”?

  • αἴκα

 

Perhaps I’m not Icarus,

Perhaps I am Daedalus:

THE ONE THAT

S U R V I V E D.